The Kansas State obsession with the Jayhawks continues in incident involving marching band

The Kansas State obsession with the Kansas Jayhawks is well-documented. From chanting "f--- KU" at games between the schools, to selling DVDs of relatively insignificant victories over Kansas basketball, to storming the court at Bramlage last season and assaulting KU players,  the hate is strong in Manhattan. This is to say nothing of the reaction you get from a K-state fan by simply identifying yourself as a Jayhawk. The KSU side of this in-state rivalry has always had strong feelings for KU that have never been fully reciprocated (which only seems to incite increasingly over-the-top behavior).

Another chapter was added to the book of Kansas State's weird obsession with Jayhawks last night, this time coming courtesy of their marching band.  During a Star Trek-themed halftime show (because nothing says football, like Star Trek, amirite?), the band assumed the following formation:

Now, Kansas State's official statement is that this represented the starship enterprise on the right "defeating" the Jayhawk on the left, but the general reaction of those who have seen it is more along the lines of "why is that marching band shoving its junk into that Jayhawk's beak?" I have a few thoughts on this. First, since this was evidently a Star Trek -themed show, it would seem out of place for the band to take the shape of human genitals. If they were playing Lil Jon's "Get Low" at the time, I'd be more incredulous. But the Starship Enterprise fits the theme,  so I'm going to give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that the figure on the right was intended to resemble the famous fictitious ship, and the students in the formation just aren't very good at what they do, resulting in a very rounded, elongated shape that resembled a dude's package.

With that said, the controversy could easily have been avoided. What's that you say? It could have been avoided by the director doing a better job of designing the formation and the band members doing a better job of forming it? Well yes, of course, there's that. But what I'm referring to is that this could have been avoided if the band hadn't decided to superfluously include the shape of a Jayhawk in their halftime show, which didn't even take place in a game against Kansas. It's becoming downright impossible to take seriously the K-Staters' denial of a psychotic, hateful obsession with their neighbors to the east when they can't even get through halftime of their season opener against South Dakota without bringing a Jayhawk into it.

The band issued a standard, half-assed non-apology on Twitter, stating "we apologize for anyone offended by our halftime performance depicting the starship enterprise and the Jayhawk mascot." Nicely done. Sounds an awful lot like a kid's forced apology after he hits another kid. "Sorry your stupid face ran into my fist." I guess my only question is, if that's what you were depicting, why are you apologizing? Maybe there's something to this "misinterpretation" after all...

Oh well, K-State gonna K-State. I'm going to just keep laughing at these sorts of "mishaps," knowing my very existence is eating away at Wildcats fans' furious, bitter little hearts.